This was a book which Babel lent me, and it took me an incredibly long time to read. I’m not sure why, because I wouldn’t go as far as to say it was bad. Perhaps after how good he had told me it was, I just found it somewhat of an anti-climax. The premise of the book, which is that Hitler won the Second World War and is still in power in the 1960s, is an amazing, mind-blowing idea; the amount of thought which has got into recreating this version of the 1960s which never existed is deeply impressive; but somehow, the actual characters and plot failed to grab me and by the time I got to the end I was left with the feeling that I’d just read a rather mediocre thriller. (more…)